Yellow Bird
by Caitlynnn
Summary: "And I never thought this life was possible... you're the yellow bird that I've been waiting for." A story of small but meaningful memories right before Eli's graduation. Adam/Eli Eli/Julia some Eli/Clare. ONESHOT


**It's been a while since I've posted something! I finally got my Word Document to work. So here's my first story on my new computer and Word Document after a long period. **

**This story is pretty close to my heart, as is every story I write, but last night I got some pretty crappy news and I cried myself to sleep, so this may be too emotional or too dull, I don't know. I'll let you guys decide. But it's all good. Change. It's scary... but I've had to accept it. **

"**Yellow Bird" is the title, and it's taken from the song, Poison Oak. I suggest you look it up because it's a beautiful song by one of my favourite bands called Bright Eyes. I hope you enjoy it. **

**Don't own Poison Oak, or Degrassi. **

**I. **

"_Poison oak, some boyhood bravery  
when the telephone was a tin can on a string  
And I fell asleep with you still talking to me  
you said you weren't afraid to die."_

There is worry all his room. He knows this because his room is messy again. He hasn't bothered cleaning his room. He doesn't care that the cups are piling up again. It's perhaps obvious that a writer has died in here because papers are everywhere; lines crossed out, numerous types of pen ink are all over the crinkled up page.

When he closes his eyes again, the scent lingers, and his body becomes nostalgic, he sees lines and different colours when he closes his eyes, but then they align and draws a face, a simple memory. This isn't supposed to happen. But memories and nostalgia is a beautiful, terrible thing.

Eli reverses back to early childhood. Its common, his mother says, that in a moment of tragedy, to think back to when one was innocent...

He remembers being hunched over in the garage, with yarn-type string. It threads its way through, and then he ties a not to secure the tin can. It's a genius invention, he thinks.

"What a smart boy," his mother says, his bright eyes look up at her and he gives her a cheeky smile.

"Want to try it?" Julia says to Eli, he nods and they hold hands, each grabbing one end of the tin can.

All night Julia and Eli talk, their houses are so close together that it works, the string long enough, and they can see each other right out the window.

They talk all night, well as long as two ten year olds can stay up till. He fell asleep to her still talking to him...

It's scary thing to fall in love. Its frightening be able to fall in love twice.

"I think everyone wants to be held or loved. Just sometimes bad things happen to people and they don't want to be held anymore. Everyone ends up kissing and loving the wrong person every night before bed." Julia says to Eli one night through the tin cans. Julia is thirteen now, and Eli is fourteen. There is something about tradition that still makes them want to use them.

"But I kissed you a few minutes ago." Eli says.

"I know. That's the whole point." She says and sighs.

"Eli? You know there's a difference between you and I." She says this almost chipper and then she smirks to herself.

"I'm not afraid to die."

**II. **

He opens his eyes and he realizes that he's still in his room; nothing has changed, except for him.

Young love is real. He fell in love with Julia at fourteen. People don't think its possible. When you're young its true that your feelings are scattered, but Eli thought that when you're young and you find that person that becomes your world, that person who becomes the reason you get up out of bed every morning, the person you just want to make happy, it has to be real. There's something true and profound about it. People grow up to be cynical, it's saddening because all Eli wanted was to love and be loved.

**III. **

"_In Polaroid's you were dressed in women's clothes  
were you made ashamed?  
Why did you lock them in the drawer?  
And I don't think that I ever loved you more." _

It was in the early rebellion stages; at least that's what Eli called it, where he would run away. Though he'd go to one place: Torres residence.

He would stay there for many nights and then he'd go home when he was good and ready. Today though, Eli and the Torres family go clothe shopping.

"Gracie," Audra says, "The girls section is over there." She points out and Eli pats Gracie on the shoulder.

"May the god of clothing be with you, my friend," Eli smirks at her as he goes with Drew to the boy's section.

Gracie follows him and goes by Eli. "What's up?" He asks concerned, Gracie is blinking back tears. "I don't want girls clothes." She says.

Eli doesn't understand but he's trying. "Okay," he says as he closes his eyes, "Tell me what you want and I'll buy it for you." Eli says in a whisper.

Gracie looks through all the racks and pick out what she wants and then Gracie heads back to the girls section grabbing a dress and asks Eli to come with her to the dressing room. She's crying as she puts on the dress, not caring that Eli is watching. Eli isn't sure what he's doing, but he stays in the tight little corners with Gracie.

"I need you to do me a favor." Gracie whispers.

Eli nods, waiting.

"I need you to kiss me."

"Gracie-"

"Please." Gracie says and Eli closes his eyes and nods.

He presses his lips to hers and Gracie cries, and she deepens the kiss and Eli just goes along with it because this is the favor she asked for. When Gracie pulls away and backs herself up against the wall and says, "I felt nothing. I'm all wrong."

Gracie did buy the dress and Eli bought her the clothes and when they got home Gracie tucked the dress in the bottom of the drawer.

Eli walked in Gracie's bedroom and sat on her bed and then handed her the clothes.

It was something Gracie always knew deep down, but she'd never say it out loud, because she knew that her mom would never approve. But _he _was there. Always there, whispering. He was a ghost wanting to be freed.

"Eli." She spoke in a whisper.

"What?" he said in the same tone.

"It's Adam, okay?"

"Okay."

**IV.**

"_Than when you turned away  
when you slammed the door  
when you stole the car and drove towards Mexico  
and you wrote bad checks just to fill your arm  
I was young enough, I still believed in war."_

Eli doesn't attempt to move as he lies in bed, the papers spread around him, and he stares at the ceiling...

There's beauty in pain, he always thought. Just the beauty to feel something, just the beauty of having that ache always in your chest, gnawing at your guy and heading up to trap your throat. That's the beauty to know that you're human, and you make mistakes and you'll always make them until the day you die. Now that's when you get rest.

Eli is sixteen, and he just got his license. Julia orders him around to take her places, and he takes her. They're in the country, windows rolled down; a mixed CD was made for this occasion. They listen to it and Julia's hand is out the window and she makes waves with the air. Eli is belting out the song, the sun in shining and it's so beautiful. Too beautiful to be real, but then again Eli always thinks that about Julia. But this is more than that. It's more than life it feels like. You're stuck in a moment. He wants to stay here forever. Julia sneaks her hand over by Eli and she locks their hands together and Eli gives a gentle squeeze. Sometimes that's all you need is just a squeeze to know that you're alive and you're loved.

Eli drops her off at home and then he leaves and goes on his own adventure alone. There are moments in life where sometimes being alone is the only cure and he knows that's where he's at. There is just too much going on sometimes and he can't even wrap his mind around it. He thinks back to when they were kids and they still used the tin cans.

When he does get home he lays in bed and he watches out his window knowing that the house right next to him lies the girl he loves and that's just enough to make him smile. At the moment he wouldn't change anything about his life because it's perfect. He's about to sleep when he sees Julia's shades come up from her window. He heads towards his window and he puts his ear against the tin can.

"Hi." She says her voice very hoarse.

"Hi." He whispers into the tin can.

"Um." She says and he can tell that she's been crying. "I don't know what to do." She says.

And he closes his eyes and says, "What do you mean?"

"I love my boyfriend, but he's also my best friend. I don't want to ruin that." She says and that doesn't make sense at all to Eli. But then again he never really knew Julia at all. She had always been a mystery to him. In comparison, Eli was a puddle and Julia was as deep as an ocean. Her thoughts were sporadic; she had the mind of a poet. She had beautiful words and she brought it upon whoever would listen to her, which was all.

"Meet me halfway." He says as he puts the tin can down and opens his window up more and then he's on the roof and so is she, their roofs almost connecting and he wraps his arms around her and she cries a lot and says many things that Eli doesn't understand.

"I'm not afraid to die." She says to him, "I don't want to die." It's a whisper and he doesn't know what to say. "It's good to be loved." She says again and then adds, "Even if it's just for one night." She buries herself in his chest, and listens to his heartbeat.

"This is constant." She says pointing to his chest and she wipes the tears off and then heads back inside.

After that night, something had changed in Julia. She was never around anymore. She was there, but at the same time she wasn't. Her random deep thoughts weren't as thoughtful as they used to be. She became something of a space case. Not there her head in the clouds, she said she'd find a place for herself up in the clouds and hoped to God that it wouldn't vacuum her up like she feared.

Eli remembers one night that she took the car and just took off for days. He was worried sick about her and tried finding her but she wasn't having it. He looked everywhere it seemed like but she was still there somewhere. He then found her in the cemetery at night and she was standing over random grades and then she collapsed in the grass and started to inject something into her arms.

She smiled wickedly at Eli when he found her and then she overdosed and died right there in the cemetery in Eli's arms.

That was the worst part for Eli knowing that she was all wrong in the head but too far strung out to change anything.

**V. **

"_Let the poets cry themselves to sleep  
and all their tearful words could turn back into steam."_

Standing on a thin wire he looks down at the buildings and he thinks about jumping to stop all the pain and all the sorrow he feels and he knows he can't do that to his family and friends that care for him but he wants to. He really wants to do it. To jump off and feel nothing, or to stick the blade deeper into his skin and watches as the blood oozes out his arm, or to take the entire bottle of pills that would put him in a deep slumber forever and the only thing you would have left is an empty shell of a body. No one is home, come another day.

There's a dark pattern in his mind and he keeps trying to escape it. Eli is all twisted, he's a head fuck and he knows it, too. He doesn't like being this way but he knows it's not possible. But that's why there is the power of a car and a license. He grabs those things, and he's not going to kill himself, not tonight but he is going to make another memory out of it.

Once he's somewhere safe he allows the tears to come and poor out, the windows are rolled down and he cries and he moans and he yells and he repeats to himself, "Its not fair." Somehow chanting it would make it feel better, and somehow crying himself to sleep that night just helps the ache a little bit.

For him, its like Julia moved to a different city and its a permanent move and no matter how many miles she puts between them Eli will never catch up to her because she's always ahead of the game, she owns the game its her rules and not his. But he knows that she's not in another city. She's dead. Gone. Never coming back. He has no idea where she is. Heaven. Hell. Oblivion. He hopes it's not the last because that is something he fears most. But as long as he keeps her memory alive she won't ever be in that place.

So pretty. So smart. Such a waste of a young heart, he thinks.

He is standing at her grave.

"Too pretty for your own good. That's why you destroy everything you touch."

**VI.**

___"But me, I'm a single cell on a serpent's tongue  
and there's a muddy field where a garden was  
And I'm glad you got away, but I'm still stuck out hear  
my clothes are soaking wet from your brother's tears."_

Papers are spread all over the halls of the school. Eli laughs all the way to his locker and Clare is holding his hand.

"So." She says to him as he starts emptying his locker. "Are you excited?" She says her eyes glistening at him.

Eli shrugs and then says, "I guess." He isn't sure anymore on life. He's kind of confused about it all. He knows he should be happy, but he isn't. Not really. There is so much going on and so much to take in he can't believe school is done and over with. He went through years of torture and years of pain and teenage angst he doesn't know how to feel about it. He's graduating. He's leaving Degrassi behind and going onto bigger and better things. He's going to be free. That's what he thinks.

He could be a doctor, a politician, he can stand up to Obama, he could yell at his face, give him the middle finger, he could be anyone, he could be anything; he could be a writer, and write beautiful prose and scarcely twisted tales like Chuck Palahniuk, or write words of brilliance like John Green. So many options and he has no idea where to start, where to go from her. He should be happy. He's graduating goddamnit.

But where do you go from here? Now that's the thing that scares him. The big unknown. He needs that sense of control that sense of things will be okay. He can't walk in blind; it just doesn't work that way for him.

"It's just..." Eli says stuffing more books in his bags. "You go through all these experiences, and then just a day like today, they're no longer yours to experience." He says not sure if that makes sense.

"Hey." Adam walks up behind Eli and he turns to his best friend and smiles, and in that moment Eli flashes back to when they were kids and he asked him to kiss him. His whole friendship with Adam is beautiful. They talk and they don't talk because they know. That's beauty.

"Are you excited?" Adam says smiling at Eli and he rolls his eyes as he shrugs. "I guess." He isn't sure what to really feel.

"You guys are going to be the seniors now." He says looking at Clare and Adam. "You guys will be one of the oldest." He says with a hint of a smirk and Clare smiles and rolls her eyes and Adam shakes his head laughing.

"I'm just nostalgic," Eli says and shrugs as he takes the last thing out of his locker and puts it in his bag. Before he closes it forever he just takes a quick look at it, and all the stuff that had been in it, and all the memorable talks he had at that locker.

He sighs and exhales as he slowly closes it.

"You okay?" Adam asks and he closes his eyes and then nods. "I will."

They walk out of the school.

"We're coming back tomorrow." Adam says and then Eli puts his arms around both Adam and Clare.

"For now lets party!" he says and they both laugh knowing that Eli's definition of party is just hanging around his house having pizza.

They're crowded in Fiona's apartment, Eli is on his third beer, and he's barely feeling a buzz. Fiona is drinking her energy drinks and Imogen is trying to set up some more lights somewhere. Jake and Eli are playing beer pong and Clare is rolling her eyes the entire time but with a playful smile, as Eli has to take another drink.

"Fuck." He says as he takes another red cup and chugs it, some getting on his shirt.

"Every time you say fuck we should all take a drink." Jake says with a laugh as he takes a drink for the hell of it.

"Fuck you." Eli says and everyone takes a drink and that makes Eli crack up.

"I better go..." he says looking for a clock.

"Half of us in the room are graduating tomorrow." He takes another drink and grabs his jacket and Clare and Adam follows him out the door.

The air is warm, summer feel already kicked in.

Clare drives and Eli is sleeping in the backseat.

Bullfrog meets Clare at the door and he laughs knowing that Eli would get a little shitfaced. Clare kisses his cheek and then says goodnight to Bullfrog and says she'll see them tomorrow.

**VII.**

"_And I never thought this life was possible  
You're the yellow bird that I've been waiting for."_

"When we were kids, they asked us, what did we want to be when we grew up? Of course, we all said numerous things like, lets say, astronaut, or the president. Now, those are pretty big ambitions for a kid. And as a parent I hope you did not crush your child's dream by telling them that they wouldn't be it... But as we got older, we gained more perspective, grew some attitude, and some of us got into smoking or drinking, and be really hungover the next day at school. Now, you all laugh now, some of you having been there, but you all know its true. When we're in the middle of growing up you don't really know what you want to be yet. I suppose that's the beautiful thing about being human we just don't know until its that instant moment where we say, hey, I think I want to be a politician, or hey, I want to be a doctor. But there's always that other half still not even sure what they want to be yet. And that is okay.

We're going to make some big mistakes, and if highschool taught me anything, its that make those mistakes now, in highschool, at least you have people to back you up, and yeah, sometimes its going to suck, there are going to be nights where you really just don't want to do the homework, yet you forced yourself to go the extra mile and do it anyway. Welcome to Degrassi.

As a student body, we all have been through a lot; we cannot function without the other. Sure, we may lose a limb or two, but we still have the heart. It's difficult, definitely not easy, but still each part is important... I guess what I'm trying to say is: it's been a hard year. Hearts have been broken, students have died, people found love, we learned things we didn't think was possible when we were in fourth grade, and we found out what we do and don't want to do. We're still growing up.

I kind of dove into my speech without even recognizing the people who have helped me this far, but the thing is, everyone in my class has helped me get here, because, well we all help each other in a way, like by pushing me down in the hall, or whispering my name as they pass by, or simply asking me about the homework that was due, its the small things that help you get to the big thing. And right now in this moment of time, that big thing is happening. Graduation. And to be honest, I didn't think I'd make it this far.

I do want to thank my parents for not giving up on me, and for believing in me, and all the teachers for putting up with my smart mouth. I have a novel worth of people to thank and I don't have all day, but I really do appreciate everyone here... it was hard the past last days knowing that after today, we won't be coming back. We'll be going our separate ways, each having our own destiny picked out. That's scary. Everything is changing.

So for my last word, I feel like I should tell you all a story about a coal miner. I picked this up at the library, well; I actually bought it because they were having a book sale, and its pretty interesting.

They would take a yellow canary, put it in a cage and send down in the coal mine and they would bring it back up. If it was alive the air was safe to breathe for the miners. But one time this guy who wrote the book, it was his last day, because he had found out a few months ago that he had only six months to live because there was cancer in his body. They tried everything, and he remembers going out on the job one last time. Everyone was packing up and getting ready to leave and he decided to stay for a while. He had taken the yellow canary bird and then put it in its cage and slowly sent it down and he made a pact with himself that if the bird came back up alive, he'd be okay, but if it died, he'd kill himself.

He didn't have a family, no one to go home to, no one to kiss on the cheek or kids coming up to meet him at the door, no dog to feed, he didn't have much to really live for so, he took the bird down, and then he brought it back up and it was... alive.

The reason why I bring that story up is because when you're in highschool, you will feel like that sometimes it's the end of the world... and its not. It's just the beginning. Many times we feel like its not going to be okay. We feel like the yellow bird won't come back up alive and there will be no hope. But there is. Sometimes you just kind of have to stick it out and endure it, even if it feels like you don't benefit anything just keep at it... that way when they ask us what we want to be when we grow up, we won't have to guess we'll know. Thank you."

Eli steps off the podium and Mr. Simpson says a few words and then moments later everyone flips off their hats and tosses them in the air.

And just like that... its done.

**VIII. **

"_The end of paralysis, I was a statuette  
Now I'm drunk as hell on a piano bench  
and when I press the keys, it all gets reversed  
The sound of loneliness makes me happier."_

It was a hate crime, they said. Adam Torres' death was planned, they said. Everyone waited at the hospital, literally everyone who was at the graduation was there at the hospital each filling up the place. Everyone grabbing on to each other, forgetting everything Eli said on the podium earlier. But that doesn't even matter.

When they announced that Adam Torres was officially dead, everyone was in shock. They weren't suspecting that. Eli couldn't help but blame himself for everything that had happen. Clare cried and she needed someone and Eli couldn't be that for her. So he left and went to his house and lay in his bed.

He had come to a full circle. It looked like someone had died in his room. Everything was strewn many places in his room. A hurricane had whipped through and he had no idea how that happened he just knew that it dead.

Adam Torres was dead. The guy he kissed in the dressing room, the guy that bailed him out of numerous situations, and the guy that was there when Julia died. It was all crashing down on him now and he had no idea what to do with all the guilt and anger he felt. He knew that a drive wouldn't help it. Because when someone you love dies a second time you start to feel like whatever you touch will die too.

People texted Eli and called him asking him how he was and he didn't even know how to answer. He tried to write but that didn't help. He wanted to cry, but he couldn't. It wasn't fucking fair because Adam would be starting his senior year, and they would live together, and watch each other's kids later in life. It wasn't fucking fair. He would never get to grow up and see his wife, his beautiful bride. No one would know what a great catch he was. That was the thing that hurt most is that he was never coming back.

The bullet hit Adam good. Adam was a strong warrior but he wasn't strong enough. Eli couldn't stand that.

He would be going off to college in New York, leaving everyone behind.

He opens his window and he takes the tin can knowing no one has lived in the house in years. He still talks in it.

"Hello?" He says and laughs at himself and tears slowly roll down his cheek. He laughs at himself again as he tries to listen for someone to speak back to him.

He shakes his head as he puts the can away and takes his jacket and grabs the car keys and heads out the door. He unrolls the windows and sticks his head out as he lets the tears fall again. He knows that this doesn't help. But he's doing it for the sake of doing it. He thinks to a time when Adam and Eli were fourteen, they were hanging out by the creek near the house, and they were talking about how Adam was a transgender and somehow the conversation escalated into something bigger...

"I'm fucked up." Adam says, tying and untying his shoes.

"Everyone is." Eli says lightly throwing rocks in the creek.

Adam shakes his head and says, "You know when I was six, my teacher asked me to think of something beautiful... I said 9/11. And then she went on to say how many people died, and I knew then that I was wrong."

Eli steps out of his reverie and shakes his head. "Adam." He says knowing that Adam can't hear him.

He stops the car and pulls over by a patch of shade and leans back closing his eyes thinking about his speech and thinking about how things got to be like this and how far he's come. He's filled with grief and his heart is heavy.

It had been weeks since Adam's death and Eli was supposed to leave soon for college and he had no idea how he was going to survive. When someone you love dies it changes things. Love changes things. When you love someone you're willing to take their place and maybe that's what Eli was trying to say in his speech. He hadn't figured it out until now but... his family and his friends were his yellow birds. They all were that hope that things would be okay again. Eli had grabbed the book he quoted in his speech he brought it everywhere. The book was called, "Yellow Bird" and he really wanted to know if the author really did die or not. It was written last year and he knew that the author was probably long gone now and that made Eli sad because the first time he read it he was just shocked at the utter beauty of it.

Life's fragile.

People come and go and people change and leave, people die or people are born. It's a short timeline and that's what scared Eli was change. He didn't like it. He didn't want to be far away from Clare but he had to be. He wanted his parents close but there was a part of him that knew that Eli needed to be alone for a while and learn to grow up on his own without anyone there.

So as Eli flips to the page where he left off rereading a word catches his eye, "And I knew that life would be okay again because the yellow bird did come back. Though its wings were a bit broken and it looked like it had gone through hell. And if all else perished and it remained I would still continue to be."

It comes back to the moments. Sometimes that's all you got. Eli starts his car again knowing that he has to pack and he has to visit Adam's grave before he leaves. He already feels like he's missing something and he hates that feeling, but that's what often happens. Death is instant. It's random.

Because there's a big fucking world out there: it's messy and chaotic and never the thing you'd expect.

He's not sure on the future. And he's not sure if he can handle it. But he knows that he'll have to handle it. Sometimes that's all you got...

But he's okay with that.

**So there is actually no book called Yellow Bird that I'm aware of. I made it up. But its actually true coal miners did send birds to see if it was okay. So that part is true, but the rest I made up. Mostly what I was trying to translate in this story is that life is chaotic and its random but yet there's totally a reason behind everything even if we as humans don't see it yet. **

**Review? **


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